The Blue Collar Scholar

You will certainly hear multiple talking heads on documentaries or semi-educational programming talking about how the 27 books of the New Testament were chosen "arbitrarily," and that there are hundreds of books that were "erased" or "removed" from the New Testament canon, with the implication being that the Christianity that emerged from the first 3 centuries was really just the survivor of a no...

This episode gives a brief overview of the Church Fathers. We discuss the importance of the Council of Nicaea, the Ontological Argument, The Schism between the Eastern and Western Church, and the Protestant Reformation. Unfortunately, I do not have the time or the expertise to spend as much time on the text of the Early Church Fathers' writings as I would like. But the good news is that most-if-no...

We complete our study of the text of the New Testament by taking a look at Luke & Acts, which together make Luke the Evangelist the most prolific author of the New Testament. Through Luke, we have most of Paul's ministry accounts which puts the many letters of Paul in their proper context.

The New Testament opens with four accounts of Jesus life. The first two of these Gospels, Matthew and Mark, are the topic of discussion in this lecture. In this episode we will discuss the two earliest written Gospel accounts. We discuss which of the Gospels, Matthew or Mark, is the first written. We also look into the mysterious Q source, and make an argument that Q represents the oral traditions...

The four books with the word "John" in them plus the book of Revelation all all written by an author named "John." This could be several different Johns, or it could be The Apostle John. In this episode, I make the case that the Apostle John could be the author of all five books, even though the books are very, very different.

The #1 disciple, Simon (who Jesus named Peter) left us 2 letters. And Jude, the half-brother of Christ, gave us a short letter that is very similar in style and substance to 2 Peter. So in this episode we analyze these three epistles. Why, for instance, do these three letters refer to &/or quote the non-canonical book First Enoch? What warnings do these epistles give us to avoid false teachers? Wh...

This episode explores the incredible, academic, and very Jewish book called Hebrews. Who wrote it? Who is Melchizedek? What about those warning passages? ... In the second half, we look at the epistle of James. Also written to a predominately Jewish audience, the half-brother of Jesus gives us a robust defense of good works in the closest thing in the New Testament to Proverbs.

There is significant disagreement amongst scholars as to whether the Apostle Paul really wrote 1 Timothy, 2 Timothy, or Titus, collectively known as the Pastoral Epistles. In this episode we will discuss the possibility of pseudonymity and also the possibility that Paul is the author. We also look into some of the content of the books. We also look at Titus and Timothy, the men who received these...

As the Book of Acts comes to a close, the Apostle Paul finds himself in prison. While under guard in house arrest, Paul is able to commune with the Roman church and to communicate with other churches via letters. It is highly likely that Ephesians, Colossians, Philemon, and Philippians (known collectively as the "prison epistles") were written at this time.

The church at Corinth was the Apostle Paul's most messed up church. But he loved them and stuck with them. In this episode we analyze two of his largest letters, both sent to the Christian church in this important Greek city.

Salvation is an important part of theology. Indeed, it is one of the core doctrines of Christian theology and the Gospel is the core theme of all of Paul's writings. Since Romans is a letter written by Paul to a church he has not yet visited, he seems to have been careful to lay out his teaching about the Gospel more clearly in Romans than in any other epistle. In this episode we will examine "The...

Romans is the best theological text ever written. In this episode, we will examine who wrote it, why it was written, to whom it was written, and what are the major themes taught by the epistle to the Romans. This episode also contains an impromptu classroom discussion over the role of women as presented in Paul's writings.

In this episode, we begin our discussions about the actual text of the New Testament. We start by introducing the author of much of it, the Apostle Paul. Next, we briefly look at Galatians and both epistles to the Thessalonians.

Knowing about the Roman Empire is key to understanding the context of the New Testament. Jesus, His disciples, and the Apostle Paul all ministered in the Roman Empire. Judea, Galilee, Asia Minor, Greece, Egypt, and (obviously) the Italian Peninsula were all part of the Empire. Every person who heard one of their sermons, received healing, or joined the growing church was a subject of Rome. This ep...

In this episode we take a brief look at the world created by Alexander the Great's monumental conquests, and by his early death and the fracturing of his empire. We will then focus in on the Jewish people living in this time, and add another layer to our knowledge of the world that the New Testament was introduced to.

This is a valiant attempt at a thorough overview of the Old Testament in a single lecture. In this episode, we examine the story of the Old Testament in chronological order as presented in the texts of the Old Testament. We also take a look at major themes of the Old Testament.

This episode is a brief survey of the major civilizations and empires that constitute the appropriate context for the Old Testament, which itself is the most important bit of context for the New Testament.

This fall we are starting a new class as we dig into the New Testament. In this episode, we preview the order of topics we will cover along the way, look at the Koine Greek text that the New Testament was originally written in, and discuss the importance of reading the texts in chronological order so as to identify and assess theological development in the New Testament.

This is a sermon given at a local United Methodist church in my hometown on 8/21/2022. This sermon acts as an introduction, of sorts, to the New Testament class that will dominate this podcast feed for the next few months. I hope you enjoy!

In this episode, we wander into dangerous, controversial waters: namely, current events. The events of January 6, 2021, have put Donald Trump in hot water and in danger of criminal prosecution. Once upon a time in the '70s, another former President was in a similar situation. Back then, President Ford chose to pardon Nixon, almost certainly ending his chances to win in 1976, but saving us all from...

The Civil War changed the United States of America. Just how the war changed our country is explored in this episode of the podcast. We will also take on many controversies related to the Civil War, like the Confederate battle flag and Confederate statues.

Reconstruction was the process by which all the states that had seceded from the United States were reintegrated into the Union. It is also the time when Constitutional Amendments were ratified that laid the framework to give Civil Rights to African-Americans. Those amendments, thankfully, proved to be resilient as nearly every other bit of social justice progress made in the Reconstruction era wa...

Even before the Civil War was over, the attempt to reframe the entire Confederate project was underway. The result was "The Lost Cause," which asserted that the South was a superior culture with superior warriors, and that the war was only lost because the North had overwhelming numbers and supplies. But mostly, The Lost Cause begs us to believe that slavery was not the cause of secession or the w...

What if the South had won the Civil War? What if Stonewall Jackson had not died at Chancellorsville? What if Abraham Lincoln was never assassinated? What if McClellan had taken Richmond and won the war in the Peninsular Campaign?

This episode documents the final battles and offensives that resulted in the surrender of the military forces of the South and the collapse of the Confederate States of America. We will also look at the assassination of Abraham Lincoln.